


Follow My Lead

by angellwings



Category: Chicago Fire
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Friendship/Love, Mutual Pining, One Shot, Set during 8x19 "Light Things Up", Unresolved Romantic Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-11
Updated: 2020-07-11
Packaged: 2021-03-05 02:22:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,677
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25196893
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/angellwings/pseuds/angellwings
Summary: Premise: Matt and Sylvie take a tipsy selfie at Joe and Chloe’s wedding.
Relationships: Sylvie Brett/Matthew Casey
Comments: 37
Kudos: 147





	Follow My Lead

**Author's Note:**

> **A/N:** So, this premise was taken from Twitter: Matt and Sylvie take a tipsy selfie at Joe and Chloe’s wedding. I’m not sure I nailed the tipsy part, BUT I got everything else lol. It’s short and sweet. Hopefully you’ll all enjoy a little light fluff for the weekend.
> 
> Happy reading!
> 
> xoxo

***

_“Although I may not be the man some,_

_Girls think of as handsome,_

_To her heart I'll carry the key._

_Won't you tell her please to put on some speed?_

_Follow my lead, oh, how I need,_

_Someone to watch over me.”_

_-George Gershwin (from a version recorded by Frank Sinatra)_

***

Frankly, it’s been a while since 51 had a truly _good_ excuse to celebrate. Which of course means they’re all going gangbusters at Joe’s wedding. There’s an open bar that Matt is certain everyone will regret visiting in the morning and no shortage of laughter.

The wedding party introductions are over, the food has been served, and all the necessary speeches have been made. The first dance and the cutting of the cake are easy compared to all the other moving parts of this enormously expensive party and, mercifully, do not directly involve all members of the wedding party.

They can all relax.

Sylvie acknowledges this by stealing his untouched glass of champagne. If there’s an open bar, he’s not wasting his alcohol tolerance on _champagne_. 

“You weren’t going to drink this, right?”

He chuckles, shakes his head, and sweeps a hand out in front of him. “Help yourself.”

“It really is a beautiful wedding,” she says, glancing around the reception hall observantly.

And _she_ looks _beautiful_ in that dress. He needs to thank Chloe for having such good taste in bridesmaids gowns. The sapphire blue suits Sylvie’s coloring in a way that makes her glow with warmth while also highlighting the cornflower shade of her eyes. Don’t get him wrong, the color works just as well for everyone else but it seems tailor made for Sylvie Brett. 

She’s _stunning_. So stunning that he had a difficult time focusing on the ceremony earlier. He’s convinced that no one who had her standing across from them would have managed any better.

“It is,” he agrees. “I’m going to go get a drink. Do you need anything while I’m up?”

“No,” she says, tossing him a grateful smile. “Thank you, though.”

He hesitantly makes his way across the room to reach the bar. His feet and heart fight the idea of leaving Sylvie. She’s had a hell of a week and, even though she seems fine now, he feels an overwhelming need to stay close. He’s beginning to think his heart is officially tethered to hers. He’s not sure what to do about it.

He gets a scotch on the rocks and heads back to their table as quickly as possible. He does a double take at the glass in Sylvie’s hand when he arrives. It’s full again. When he left her, she’d drained it by half.

She gives him a sheepish smile and shrugs. “A server came by with more champagne. Don’t judge.”

He laughs and holds one hand up in a placating gesture. “I would never. _Just_ out of curiosity, though, how many is that?”

“Three,” she answers. “Last one for a while.”

“Uh huh,” he says with a teasing grin. “Sure it is.”

“It is!” She replies as she laughingly swats at his arm. “I do know how to control myself.”

“As long as we keep you away from Foster,” he supplies with an amused lift of his brows.

She blushes and uses the hand not holding her champagne flute to cover her eyes. “Oh God. I’m never living that down, am I?”

“Definitely not. It wasn’t so bad, though. You’re a cute drunk,” he admits honestly.

“I am a happy gullible drunk whose abysmal ability to keep secrets somehow gets ten times worse than it is when I’m sober,” she tells him, slowly peeling her hand away from her face. “God, thank you for reminding me of that. This is _definitely_ my last glass for a while.”

She’s true to her word and stays away from the champagne, but after Joe and Chloe’s first dance she turns to him and glances down at the last sips of his scotch.

“I don’t get the appeal of that stuff,” she says, wrinkling her nose in a way that’s much too adorable in his opinion.

“No?” He asks. He’s amused and curious. 

“It tastes like acetone to me and it _burns_. I mean I get that it’s an acquired taste but I prefer my alcohol to not make me choke. Just a personal preference,” she says with a sharp smirk.

“You’ve got experience drinking acetone? And what’s next? Are you going to tell me you think cigars stink?”

Her eyes sparkle as she grins at him. “Well…”

He shakes his head and mocks disappointment. “Damn. Just go ahead and finish crossing off the list. Tell me how you really feel about the Bears and the Blackhawks. Go ahead.”

“Surprisingly, I don’t mind the Bears and the Blackhawks,” she concedes. “Can’t say I’m as invested as you Chicago natives are considering I’m an Indiana girl but—“

“If you say you prefer the Colts—“

The bright laugh she releases effectively cuts off his sentence. He wouldn’t dare talk over that laugh. He hasn’t had the opportunity to hear it very often these days. He’s missed it.

“This is nice,” she tells him quietly. 

“What?” He asks.

“Sitting and talking without having some huge angsty emotion getting in the way. I feel like I haven’t been able to catch a break lately,” she confesses with a tired sigh. “I need this. It feels like hitting pause so I can actually enjoy all the truly wonderful things in my life. Like my friends.” She stops and looks around the hall, her eyes skimming over Foster and Cruz and Kidd. “Well, more accurately _family_ , I guess.” And then her gaze lands on him. The lively blue of her irises clashes against his much duller ones. They share the same eye color but no one’s eyes can compare to hers. Certainly not his. She ducks her head before speaking again. “ _You_.”

He’s tempted to ask why she’s separated him from the rest of the people in the room but decides against it — in the event her answer isn’t what he wants it to be.

He holds her stare while reaching over and covering her hand with his. “We can take a pause for that anytime you want,” he assures her. “You don’t have to wait for a wedding.”

She squeezes his hand in recognition of his words. “Do me a favor and remind me of that every now and then, please?”

He nods and smiles softly. “You got it.”

She releases his hand and points to the sign sitting next to the center piece. “We should do that.”

He hadn’t even bothered to read the sign when they sat down, but he does now and he feels the deep frown pulling at the corners of his mouth as he reads aloud. “Please join us in celebrating our big day by posting on social media. Don’t forget to use our special hashtag.” He pauses and grimaces. “TheLoveCruz.”

“Be nice.” Sylvie’s tone is scolding but the way she presses her lips together tells him she’s more entertained than upset.

“I made no additional comment,” he points out. 

She snorts as delicately as possible. “You didn’t have to. Your facial expression said it all very clearly. Come on, just one picture,” she insists as she pulls her phone out of the hidden pockets of her dress.

He really doesn’t want to do this. “Do we have to?”

She rolls her eyes but smiles fondly at him. “For Cruz.”

He releases a long suffering sigh as he nods. “Fine, but we take it with mine. Your arms are too short.”

She lets out an offended noise that’s something between a grunt and a squeak and glares at him playfully. “They are not! I have the gangliest most string bean arms--”

“String bean?” He asks in confusion. “Who’s been calling you a string bean? Have they never seen you in a Zumba class?”

“Just take the picture and then text it to me so I can post it.” She stares at him pointedly and primly continues as she scoots her chair closer to his for the photo. “Yes, I’m tipsy but not so tipsy that I’ve forgotten you don’t do social media. You won’t post it so I’ll have to.”

Fuck. He really thought he might sneak that fact by her. Maybe he can “forget” to text it to her. It’s worth a shot. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“Uh huh,” she says with a light laugh. “You’re as terrible a liar as I am.”

He holds up his phone, front facing camera on, and frames them up. Sylvie is squeezed in behind him. She places her hands on his shoulder, folded one on top of the other, and then rests her cheek on her hands. She’s smiling warmly as he snaps the photo, but he hums in disapproval at his nearly confused expression. She tries to stifle a giggle into her hands, but he feels it against his shoulder.

“Don’t say it.”

“I’m not saying a word,” she says, eyes twinkling with mischief. “Take two. Go.”

The second one is much better, even if there’s a tiny sheer peach blur in the bottom corner -- probably from the edge of his finger on the lens. Hey, he never claimed to be particularly good at selfies. He just said he had longer arms than her, which is true.

“Much better,” she says softly. “You look very handsome. I like you in a bowtie.”

He shrugs and glances at her out of the corner of his eye. “You overshadow me by a mile. No one’s gonna be looking at me and my bowtie.”

She blushes prettily and removes her hands from his shoulder. He can tell she doesn’t quite know how to respond, but then the band starts a new song. She gasps and clasps her hand around his. 

“Oh! Come dance with me! I love this song.”

It’s a slow song, thankfully. He knows he can manage that without looking like a fool. Plus, it has the added bonus of distracting her so she forgets he’s supposed to text her the photo. Dancing means no cheesy hashtags or instagram captions for him tonight. He thinks that’s an extremely fair trade.

“Am I supposed to know this song?” He asks as she pulls him up and out of his seat.

“Um, yes, Matt,” she answers with an amused grin. “Everyone knows this song. ‘Someone to Watch Over Me’? It’s an American standard?”

They reach the dance floor just as he starts to recall the tune. But it sounds different and suddenly he recognizes why. The jazz band has a male vocalist. He’s only heard this song performed by women. 

“Now, I hear it,” he replies. “They changed it a little. It threw me off.”

Her arms fold around his neck as his wrap around her waist. The longer they sway to the music they closer they drift to each other until their chests are pressed together and her head is resting on his shoulder. She’s shifted their arms as they’ve moved across the floor. She has one arm still around his neck, but her other hand has removed one of his from her waist to hold it between them, resting both their hands against his chest. It’s daringly new for the two of them and breathtakingly intimate. 

He can feel her warm breath as it fans over his neck and the steady beat of her heart through their layers of formal wear. Feeling proof of her life so close has him feeling more _alive_ than he’s felt in at least a couple of years. Maybe longer, if he’s completely honest with himself.

She lifts her head from his chest as the song comes to a close and meets his gaze head on. There’s something intriguing that crackles and buzzes in her blue eyes. He finds it infectious. He wants to let himself gravitate even closer to her until his lips brush hers. He wonders if kissing her would feel as electric as her stare.

But then applause breaks out as the band announces they’re taking a break and the spell is broken. 

She clears her throat and looks down at her bare wrist, where he knows her watch band would normally be. He’s noticed she fidgets with it when she’s nervous. But she’s not wearing a watch tonight so instead the fingers of her opposite hand rub an idle circle around her wrist.

“That’s the cue for cutting the cake,” she tells him as she turns her now subdued blue eyes to the multi-tiered delicately iced artwork disguised as a dessert.

He releases her hand and her waist but leaves one of his hands on the small of her back as they join the rest of the wedding party to gather around the cake.

It occurs to him in that moment that he’s barely seen any of his other friends all night. He’s spent every moment of this wedding with Sylvie or thinking of Sylvie. He should feel guilty about that…

But he doesn’t.

Most of the time he spends with Sylvie is at work, at Molly’s, or -- here lately -- the hospital so tonight has been a refreshing change of pace. He doesn’t really want it to end. It has to, though. Tomorrow they’ll go back to their normal routines and he’ll go back to pretending he doesn’t notice the palpable chemistry between them. Shoving down his feelings is what Matt Casey does best, after all.

His phone starts to feel heavy in his jacket pocket. He pats it and grins to himself. Maybe things will go back to normal, but even if they do…

He’ll always have their picture to remember it by.

God, he’s a sap. He can never say that outloud. _To anyone_.

His resolve to not let Sylvie post it intensifies. Now it feels like a private moment he has to guard carefully. Like a secret he needs to watch over the way he watches over her.

He feels her hand on his arm and he turns to her with an expectant glance.

She leans toward him and whispers with a knowing smile. “If I promise not to post it, will you actually text me the photo?” She asks.

He stares at her in surprise. So she did notice how he avoided it, afterall. He chuckles and shakes his head at himself. He should know by now that he can’t fool her.

“I know you’re not crazy about social media and I would never force you to do something you’re not comfortable with,” she assures him. “But I would still like to have a copy. Just for me.”

He doesn’t bother answering her. Instead, he pulls his phone out of his pocket and quickly sends her the photo. She graces him with a rare beaming smile in response.

“Thank you,” she replies. “And I give you my word you won’t see it posted anywhere.”

The fact that she’s so aware of his discomfort forces him to realize something. Yes, he tends to watch over her, but she does her fair share of watching over him too. Suddenly he’s filled with grateful affection. He’s used to being the one to put other people first. What he’s not used to is someone taking his needs so seriously. He’s awed by the gesture and by her.

“Good,” he tells her, leaning further in to whisper. “Because I’d hate for a picture that good to be ruined by the hashtag ‘TheLoveCruz’.”

She snickers as quietly as she can and nods. “That would be truly tragic.”

Another day he’ll put what he feels for her into words, but not today. Today is Joe and Chloe’s day. Although, for the first time since he noticed these feelings sneaking up on him, he's truly beginning to believe…

Their day will come.

They’ll have their turn and when they do he plans to make the most of it.

If he has his way, tonight’s photo will be the first of many.


End file.
